


With All Their Lions And All Their Might And All Their Thirst

by jusrecht



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-04
Updated: 2011-05-04
Packaged: 2017-10-19 00:13:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/194782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jusrecht/pseuds/jusrecht
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Somewhere along the way, they forgot how it felt to be worthy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	With All Their Lions And All Their Might And All Their Thirst

**Author's Note:**

> Written for this prompt: _Kyoko/Haru – corruption; “out here the good girls die”_.

  
Somewhere along the way, they forgot how it felt to be worthy.

They were women, creatures of gentleness and inner rooms. They were reasons to fight, but never instruments of victory. They were loved, sheltered, protected, but they were too loved, too sheltered, too protected. Their presence brought everyone comfort, but their words went unheeded. They were valuable, but they were not worthy, and those were two very different things. Worth commanded pride, the mark of one’s value.

Pride was no longer theirs, and so neither was worth.

None of the others had noticed—not even Tsuna; Kyoko found in this realisation the worst of ironies. For all the eager, blushing love he bore for her, he was content to love. She gave him a reason to fight. She gave him pride. He gave her safety, and deemed all was well and fair.

Her best friend was the only one who saw her discontent, her rotting core. They held each other’s hand as battles whirled about them, a part of the picture and yet not. Time flew; they grew. Five years of living under Tsuna’s shadow showed the kind of women they had been reduced into—restless, unhappy, dissatisfied, jealous, without purpose.

“I want…” Haru murmured, and stopped. She wanted. They wanted. In the growing dark, in the twisting shadows of their discontent, Kyoko laced their fingers together.

“We can have it,” she said quietly, decisively. Even apathy could breed hatred.

Haru picked up a gun. Kyoko delved into wiles. If they could not live for real, then they could at least play a game.

–

They began with the little things. Learning was the root of everything. Even the great ones stumbled and fell at first.

Haru’s forte was her quickness to learn. It nearly frightened her, how easily she could acquire skill after skill—strength, speed, dexterity, precision. The curved sharpness of a knife was to her fingers a long-lost brother, the sleeping threat of a gun a new best friend. In little over two months, she became Reborn’s favourite.

Then he told her, amidst scattered bullets and shredded pieces of human dummies, “There are ways to light a dormant Flame.”

Haru knew then, there was no turning back.

  
.

  
Kyoko’s forte was something different, less exact and more elusive. She first tasted its power when a well-placed remark, a well-modulated tone, saved the Family from a burgeoning war.

Her presence so far had been strictly ornamental, but now Tsuna kissed her hand and whispered his gratitude, eyes drunken with love; she smiled and set the first stone of her path.

–

Certainly there are ways to kindle a light from nothing, but none of them was kind. Reborn never advocated kindness.

Haru screamed every step of the way. It was not impossible, Irie-san had said, his kind eyes wide with concern and unease. The Dying Will Flame was a genetic anomaly— _a disease, if you will, inherited from parent to child. Each Flame carrier is human in essence, and yet different, mutated, every cell swollen with excess mitochondria, vestibules waiting to be filled by liquid flame. Of course, it’s all the work of the DNA, the blueprint of all things. Mutation is a long process, but there have been experiments with certain osmotic method which might bring the change about—forced, naturally, not to mention risky and painful…_

In the bright haze of pain-induced delirium, Haru thought of phoenixes, how death consumed life consumed death consumed life, an endless circle of agony while one rebirth was painful enough. Somehow, it was that flimsy thread of reflection, vague and meaningless as it was, which kept her sanity against the merciless onslaught.

The blessed relief of unconsciousness did not come for a long time. Two days later, Haru woke up with tears still wetting her cheeks.

“You’re a Sun,” Reborn told her, gleeful and triumphant. Now she could be a true masterpiece—she was reborn.

  
.

  
Sharpness was one thing, knowledge quite another. Kyoko realised that her quickness was next to useless if she knew nothing about the world she was going to live in.

That was when she approached Tsuna’s father and asked for his help. Iemitsu understood her intention—certainly Tsuna’s attention was too marked to be misconstrued. If she were to marry his son in the future, then it was as well that she wasn’t entirely ignorant.

But Iemitsu was only the first. She worked silently, slowly, each rising degree. Subtlety was an art. No one noticed how hard she studied, how carefully she listened, how beautifully she spun her web. Kyoko wanted worth, not a display of it.

When Tsuna proposed six months later, she said yes.

–

The first time Haru murdered a man, she used a knife. _It’s one of the worst,_ Reborn told her when he handed her the blade, _and thus perfect for a first time._ If she found any fault in this logic, Haru knew better than to argue.

The knife was blunt—Haru knew this when she pressed one edge against her palm, cold as lingering death. The target had appeared, walking toward the corner where she crouched in waiting, her body trembling all over. The knife was blunt.

When he passed her, she made her move.

It was different, was her first thought. Human flesh was neither soft butter nor solid wood. It coursed with life and each screaming cell fought against her clumsy invasion—damn Reborn and his inadequate choice of weapon. It should have been easy, slitting a throat: left to right, a correct pressure, a precise incision. This was bloody and wet and the man thrashed and gurgled, making sounds that might have been a scream had his throat not been flooded with all that sticky fluid. She drove the knife deeper, blunt-edged and slick, meeting resistance in the form of a protruding bone, but she could no longer remember angles or trajectories. All she knew was it must end soon, and so she held him down and stabbed stabbed stabbed, until he was limp and heavy in her arms.

Haru let him fall to the ground, a very _dead_ weight. Her first instinct was to run, but the street remained empty, earless and eyeless. She forced herself to take a few deep breaths and her mind automatically fell into a damage control sequence. Blood stained her hands and upper arms; the former could disappear under a pair of dark gloves and the latter, well, her sweater was cheap and black—and black did not tolerate, only overwhelmed. Her sneakers were untouched; they would leave no print. The knife could disappear into a fold of handkerchief and then under her shirt. The thought of blood soaking her naked skin no longer moved her.

Done.

Haru did not remember walking away. She only remembered climbing six flights of stairs to reach the front door of Kyoko’s apartment. She remembered deft but careful hands peeling layers of clothes from her trembling body and removing the knife, the blue handkerchief now soaked dark, and then strong, comforting arms holding her naked form close until her wracking sobs slowly ceased. She remembered Kyoko’s gentle fingers, their reassuring weights on her scalp as they spun tangles through her hair.

Haru slept.

 _Bare hand next,_ was Reborn’s message when she checked her cell phone in the morning.

  
.

  
The first time Kyoko had felt the weight of a murder around her neck, the man’s blood spattered on her face, warm and smelling like death.

Yamamoto’s sword dripped with the slow trickle of carmine, engulfed in slow-burning fire. She stared, dumbfounded, at his moving lips, forming questions she could not hear. His eyes were different, consumed by the same hellish flame she had seen so often blinding others, and Kyoko remembered recoiling from him, from his other hand, unarmed, untainted (except it wasn’t; just because the right did the killing did not mean the left was any less guilty). She did not mean to, but the mistake was done and Yamamoto’s concern hardened into a smile, a mask.

“Are you alright?” he repeated, gentler, quieter, somehow sadder. She did not answer.

The day after, Iemitsu visited her in the mansion—Tsuna would not let her wander out of his sight—and gave her _the talk_.

Kyoko listened with teeth clenched and lips pressed together in defiance; his future father-in-law pretended to not notice. This was the other part, he spoke in a low, brisk voice, of being a Mafia Boss’ wife. Not only that dangers and threats would be her friends, she would also have to let others protect her, take a bullet for her, _kill_ for her. Did she think Tsuna’s Guardians would forgive the man who had nearly murdered her? They would hunt him down and tear him to pieces, because she would be Tsuna’s wife—and she would have to bear it. This was what it meant.

That night, she let Haru kiss and overwhelm her, taking comfort from the mess of heated touches and ragged breaths. This was no longer a game, what they were playing. In theory, she knew what was expected of her. In reality, she had no idea.

Kyoko spent the rest of the night staring at the watercolour painting across her bed, the shapes and paints dulled by night. When morning slipped in through thick yellow curtains, she turned to Haru and kissed her eyelids.

“Will you stay with me?” she asked, her voice that of a child, terrified, unsure.

Haru’s smile was wreathed by sleep but solemnly genuine. “That’s the only reason I’m here.”

It was the day they made their pledge.

–

But it was not until months and months later, that Haru found what she was looking for: in a birthday party gone awry.

She did not relish the killing—she would never take pleasure from such act, ripping lives from bodies—but even as she bloodied her hands and deafened her ears with screams, Kyoko’s presence, trailing behind her with small, flinching steps, gave her purpose. Only when the heat of the battle had receded, when she had safely seen Kyoko to the car, that she could fully appreciate what it was.

Because then Kyoko took her hands and kissed her knuckles, until her lips too were smeared with red. “Come back to me,” she said, both an order and a plea, and Haru understood love, devotion, fealty, all spun into one crystal clear moment. The headiness was intoxicating. This was why the boys fought, she realised, why they sought power so badly: with it in their hands, they could protect. _This_ was the elixir they drank, this liquid glory. (No wonder they stuffed themselves with it.)

Haru easily found the promise on her lips, though not lightly given. Kyoko squeezed her hands for one last time and then she was gone, with Fuuta at the wheel.

Alone now, Haru took a few deep, calming breaths. From a spare box, she summoned her rifle and felt its weight in her arms, cradled like a baby. It felt like purpose, cool and clear-shaped.

An explosion in the distance broke her reverie. With her hard-earned Sun flame rippling under her skin, Haru plunged back into the fight.

  
.

  
 _Adaptation,_ Kyoko reflected after she had set her mask in place, a thing of glass and hand-crafted strength, _was not difficult._ Human was born to adapt, and time was the soil which thickened with each tick of the clock, burying the coffin of thousand wounds, deeper and deeper.

The man laughed, his eyes glazed by wine, charmed by her beauty, her voice, her wit. Kyoko brought the tips of her fingers to her lips, feigning coy embarrassment. He was the heir of an allied Family and she was Don Vongola’s fiancée; it was thin ice, but practice gave her confidence. She tilted her head to the left, just a little closer, and his gaze traced the white length of her neck, the innocent curve of her lips; he was firmly under her spell.

Kyoko very nearly smirked. These little victories always amused her, like the first taste of thick chocolate on her tongue. Outwardly she said, “Oh, Tsuna never tells me much about these things. I’d love to learn, but they all seem terribly complicated.”

He nodded and smiled, all eyes and ears for her. She could almost touch his mind and feel the coolness of fecund soil, ready for her seeds of ideas. It never ceased to make her wonder, how easily she could influence someone, _anyone_ at all. Haru blamed the soothing, bewitching quality of her voice— _if you only know what it does to me._

“I completely agree,” he spoke solemnly, wholeheartedly, at the end of her discourse.

Kyoko smiled her gratitude; she would have trailed her lips on his cheek, but it was a treat she reserved for Tsuna.

–

“I’m sorry.”

Tsuna sat at the edge of the balcony, white on white. The sun shone aslant on his face, making him look older, all stark lines and pale shades. Haru still remembered when she had been helplessly in love with him, the boy with wide, soulful eyes and aching heart.

“I wish,” he spoke again, and through each syllable he held her gaze, “that I could spare at least you and Kyoko from all this… madness.”

Haru fingered her cuff, white and stiff and utterly a part of her; she did not remember when she had donned a suit for the first time, not to stand out but to blend in. “This is my choice,” she said after a moment’s reflection—procrastination.

“But it’s still my fault. Neither of you would be involved if it weren’t because of me.”

Haru clenched her fists, fighting down a sudden spark of anger. The absolute dismissal of her answer stirred an old grudge, a seething, bitter, putrid hatred gnawing at her soul. Even now, she did not belong to the cool boys’ club. The only difference was she no longer wanted to, not that much, and it helped to keep the ugliest parts of it out of her voice as she said, near accused, “Your fault? Because of you? That’s your habit, isn’t it, Tsuna-san? To take so much credit in everything.”

His uncomfortable blush at her rebuke checked her anger. Haru inhaled deeply, unclenched her fingers. “I’ve made my choice,” she told him, sombre but not regretful. “She has made her choice. Now it’s your turn to let us live our lives.”

Tsuna did not answer for a long time. It was, she thought—strangely triumphant, although no triumph should feel so hollow—the first time he had ever looked at her, not as a precious, delicate thing to be kept carefully in a pocket, but as an equal, someone to walk with, arm in arm, shoulder to shoulder. She almost pitied him; the death of an illusion was still death in the end.

“I understand,” he finally answered, his solemnity a funereal shroud. Haru thought of kissing him but the spark was no longer there; instead, she took his hands and smiled.

“Thank you.”

  
.

  
“A king could not rule with kindness alone.”

Kyoko met the large, innocent-looking eyes coolly. “I agree,” she replied, careful enough to hide the sudden bitterness which had risen at Reborn’s comment. (A pretty irony, this: it took a hitman to notice what she was doing.)

Reborn sighed and the look on his face almost betrayed his real age, cursed body or not. “I did hope once,” he said, only a touch mournful. “He is simply too kind.”

“Everyone loves him for that.”

“Yes,” Reborn’s voice was dry, “it’s easy to love kindness, until it leads them to ruin. Then everyone will hate him and think him weak, enslaved by compassion, too gullible. Fact: love is the most fickle feeling there is.”

Kyoko could not help a smile, even if it was wrenched out of her like a metal pick out of solid ice. “You’re actually a sarcastic old man underneath that façade, aren’t you?”

“I’m logical.”

“Heartless.”

“Like you’re any better.”

She watched him, a small, noncommittal smile on her lips. “I understand,” she told him and knew that he, too, understood what she kept silent. There was much more to a good king than kindness and compassion.

At the end of the year, she became Don Vongola’s wife.

\---

  
 _“I cannot be what I aim to be if I don’t change,” Kyoko began, twisting the soft sheet between her fingers. “You have killed. You know what I mean.”_

 _Haru’s lips curved, but it wasn’t a smile. “Maybe.”_

 _“What do you call someone who isn’t herself?”_

 _“Insane—or dead.”_

 _Kyoko matched her smile, a ghost without mirth. “That sounds about right.”_

 _Haru said nothing. It took Kyoko twenty full seconds to gather her thoughts, her scattered wits, and take a deep breath to pave the road of what to come. “That is why I want to leave her with you, the Sasagawa Kyoko you know,” she spoke slowly, as if afraid the words would trip over each other. “She is here, but she cannot continue living in this state. She isn’t strong enough.”_

 _Her eyes burned and she closed them, basking in their pain. It was Haru who kissed the tears that pooled at the corners, each gentle brush breaking her heart a little more. (Breaking and mending were sisters, they felt the same, almost.)_

 _It did feel a little like dying—or letting go. She cried silently, without a sound, but the silence was funeral enough._

 _“Will you do the same for me?”_

 _Kyoko looked up through tear-glazed eyes, meeting Haru’s gaze, for once unreadable as a word being crossed out and rewritten and crossed out and rewritten too many times. “She is lost, the Haru you know,” Haru's voice was plaintive, strangely hollow, and she told her how to choke a man with brute strength: how ten fingers could form a cage, how thumbs could_ press _—just like that—and how his eyes had closed, his face gone into shades of blue, and his tongue—oh his tongue._

 _Haru was sobbing and Kyoko’s left shoulder was wet with her tears. “I promise,” she whispered, they whispered, squeezing each other’s arms._

 _The warmth that slid down their cheeks soon turned cold with dawn. It was the day they made their pledge.  
_

  
\---

 **  
_End_   
**


End file.
